Artist Creates a Zoo of Chairs and Armchairs

Máximo Riera is an Asturian artist, based in Cádiz, who has been practicing photography, painting, and sculpture for over thirty years. For his latest project, he got inspired by his travels throughout Europe and the Caribbean.

The Animal Chairs collection is born from the desire to bring closure to the everyday and urban certain species of animals, which are seriously threatened with extinction. The artist chose the chair and the armchair forms of artistic expression because they are among the most universally used everyday home furniture elements. Riera says this way the animals get a space in people’s daily lives, through the union of the two concepts, chair, and animal.

The furniture pieces are designed in Spain and produced in London but marketed to the whole world, and the production process combines the latest technologies and handmade finishes. The transition from the rough sketches by Riera to the finished walrus chaise longue or the rhino chair was carried out by the London studio JH May, whose clients include Zaha Hadid and companies such as Ferrari and Chanel.

The project is based on a multi-disciplinary sense of art, combining graphics and 3D design, engineering and manufacturing. Each piece is made in a numbered limited edition, with a corresponding certificate. The designer is working also on a flying deer, an oversized beetle and two headless pieces, the toad and the zebra, which are in the final phase of production.